The Next Two Years Are Going To Be Massive For Dragon Ball Fans

The Dragon Ball franchise has always thrived in the gaming space, with plenty of great titles like Budokai Tenkaichi, Xenoverse, and FighterZ all embracing the vivid world, memorable characters, and high-octane action to their full potential. The future of the franchise looks even brighter now, though, thanks to some big announcements courtesy of Bandai Namco. At the Dragon Ball Games Battle Hour held in Los Angeles, a number of announcements were made regarding the next games in the series.

This includes some exciting new DLC for long-running titles like Xenoverse 2 and FighterZ, as well as expansions of the franchise’s free-to-play offerings. There’s also the news that the previously announced Dragon Ball Age 1000, a distant legacy sequel to the primary canon of the franchise, will actually be the next entry in the Xenoverse sub-series. It’s an exciting development all around and highlights just how much fun Dragon Ball fans are going to have in the next two years.

Dragon Ball Xenoverse 3 Being Dragon Ball Age 1000 Is A Great Move

Announced last year, Dragon Ball Age 1000 was already an exciting prospect — but the reveal that it’s actually a new entry in the Xenoverse series is a big development for Dragon Ball fans. The third entry in the Xenoverse sub-franchise, the series allows players to create their own character within the Dragon Ball universe and gives them the chance to meet with established characters, train with long-standing heroes, and save the world with their own custom persona. In the past, they’ve done this through a multiversal story where the player hero, known as the Time Patroller, works with Future Trunks and the Kais to maintain the stability of the established Dragon Ball timeline.

It’s a clever way to make the player character important without having them directly impact or influence the primary canon of the franchise. For Xenoverse 3, the plot will instead put the player character firmly in the world of Dragon Ball, albeit in Age 1000. Most Dragon Ball stories happen within the 700s, with Dragon Ball starting in Age 749, while the far more recent events of Dragon Ball Super: Super Hero happen around Age 782. This means there will be over two centuries of time since those events, opening up a completely new future for the series, with plenty of new possible allies, heroes, and villains to introduce for players to meet.

This gives the players more agency within the actual world and plot of the Dragon Ball universe — and the confirmation that Akira Toriyama had worked extensively with the game developers to flesh out the setting and characters suggests this quietly works as a canon future for the entire series. It opens up a lot of possibilities for new storytelling avenues while also potentially setting up a way for the franchise to tease out the final fates of many of the established characters. Dragon Ball Xenoverse 3 looks to be one of the most expansive additions to the franchise in some time, opening up an entirely new period and setting for fans to explore.

Dragon Ball Fans Are Getting Plenty To Play Before Xenoverse 3

While Dragon Ball Xenoverse 3 doesn’t have a confirmed release date yet outside of a planned 2027 launch, the franchise has plenty of new updates for games. Ahead of the launch of Xenoverse 3, Dragon Ball Xenoverse 2 will be getting one last stretch of DLC. “Future Saga Chapter 4” will close out the online game, which has been getting steady content drops since the game launched in 2016. It’ll also unite all of the game’s time-bending enemies and the classic foes from the franchise, serving as a fitting finale for the time-hopping game.

Xenoverse 2 will also have some crossovers with free-to-play games like Dragon Ball Z Dokkan Battle, Dragon Ball Legends, and Dragon Ball Gekishin Squadra to celebrate the legacy of the Xenoverse titles. Around the same time, Dragon Ball Sparking! Zero will be getting a massive DLC drop that includes over 30 new characters, 4 new stages, new game modes, and combat tweaks to accommodate player preferences. Both DLC releases are set for the summer of 2026, giving Dragon Ball fans plenty to spend their time on while waiting for Xenoverse 3 to drop. That’s all on top of Dragon Ball FighterZ, which is introducing more DLC characters to expand its roster.

The New Age Of Dragon Ball

All of this is coming out alongside new expansions of the anime, including an expanded version of the Beerus introduction story and the continuation of the Dragon Ball Super continuity. It’s a promising series of developments for Dragon Ball fans, highlighting the continued expansion of the franchise. Notably, it does all of this in light of the passing of series creator Akira Toriyama in 2024. The creative still had some influence on the direction of the projects, speaking to their authenticity and consistency with the history of the franchise.

However, Xenoverse 3 formally establishes a future setting for the series — coupled with Dragon Ball Super moving closer to the point where they will have adapted all the stories Toriyama directly played a role in creating — highlights how the series is moving into a new period of invention. Past criticisms levied at the franchise, especially in the world of gaming, is that Dragon Ball was becoming too complacent and comfortable with remaining focused on the greatest hits of the franchise. These announcements, which give Xenoverse 2 an epic finale while opening up an entire future for players with Xenoverse 3, suggest that the people behind the franchise are becoming more comfortable pushing the idea of what Dragon Ball could be. For Dragon Ball gamers, the announcements set the stage for some of the most exciting two years in the franchise’s history.